Carly is one of the most hyped bits of tech that I’ve seen in recent memory, and it occupies a niche that is often devoid of much excitement – OBD-II diagnostics scanners. Sure, it’s not too interesting for most non-car-people, but OBD tools are quite important to help us DIYers and mechanics decode the complexities of what makes modern cars tick, and how to fix the myriad of issues they might have. From what I’ve tested out personally, there’s definitely a good reason as to why Carly is so hyped within the car community, because it really is that game-changing! I’ve previously talked about the many things that the Carly scanner could do, including all your usual vehicle diagnostics.
It even has a tool that’ll estimate how much a specific issue with your car might cost to fix (more on that later), not to mention their insanely cool mileage tracker tool. The latter is a godsend if you’re buying a used car. Since then, though, a lot has changed, and Carly is undergoing a constant slew of updates and improvements. Carly’s own database has grown to more than 75 million diagnostic data points stored; a whopping figure no matter which way you cut it! Furthermore, they’ve been working around the clock on decoding and reverse engineering manufacturer-specific diagnostics error codes.
In layman’s terms, compared to basic generic codes, which we’re mostly used to now, that could more or less give you an idea of what might be wrong with your car, Carly’s scanner and database could now provide much more detailed diagnoses on your car. I’ve been using Carly on my personal cars, and thankfully, they have been quite reliable, so I haven’t been leaning on my Carly OBD scanner that much. Nevertheless, in the few times I’ve whipped out the Carly scanner and used it, I’m left impressed with how much you’re getting compared to other OBD scanners that I’ve used, even pricier ones. And, the Carly scanner is massively accessible.
A Very Comprehensive OBDII Diagnostics Scanner
Carly is constantly adding more car brands, and thus far, as of writing this, their platform is already compatible with more than 80 different manufacturers, offering you unparalleled coverage. The folks at Carly were keen to showcase these when they invited me and some other motoring journos to the Top Gear test track. I’ve covered this in another post, so check that out if you’re feeling nostalgic for some old Top Gear. Plus, the ex-Stig himself, Ben Collins, took me and others for some quick laps around the test track in a modified BMW M2. Between laps, though, Carly had a 3-series on the sidelines to allow us some hands-on time diagnosing it using the tool if we wanted to.
One of my favourite features of Carly’s diagnostics platform as a whole, including the scanner and the mobile app (Android and iOS), is their free Repair Costs calculator. Using this, you could type in your car’s brand, model, and model year, and choose between a vast selection of various symptoms and issues to describe the problems that you’re experiencing. From there, Carly would then spit out some estimated repair costs, localised to each of the many countries that Carly has users in, in addition to what specifically needs fixing, and what it may cost you. It is shockingly accurate, particularly for giving you an understanding of what’s wrong with your car underneath.
For example, if your engine isn’t running smoothly, it’ll give you a wide range of possible causes, whether it’s a faulty MAF sensor or a faulty coil pack. The best use case I’ve found is using this Repair Costs calculator to gauge how much the repair costs would be once I’m at the workshop, and using those figures to have some negotiating power over the local mechanic. It’s a superb tool to ensure that you’ve been quoted a realistic and fair repair bill, after all. According to Carly’s statistics, they’ve found that car owners are overpaying by around 10% and all the way up to 20% or thereabouts for car repairs, depending on the affected component(s).
Empowering Female Car Owners & Users Worldwide
In working on updating and improving their platform, Carly was also able to approach female car owners and drivers to get their input on why the Repair Costs calculator means so much. Through their surveys, Carly has found that many women generally don’t feel comfortable with taking their cars to a workshop for repairs, and found that 77% of all women surveyed were left with a bad impression. Or, they felt like they were given a bad deal for mending their cars and couldn’t fully trust workshops to give them a fair and honest quote. Equally as bad, Carly found that over 50% of women felt that they had been misled about the actual state of their cars.
To paint an even worse picture of things, 55% of the women that Carly surveyed felt like they needed to bring men to accompany them when going to workshops to be taken seriously and treated fairly. With that in mind, one of Carly’s goals is to help give women more insight into car troubles at their fingertips, and to give them a great sense of understanding of what actually needs repairing should problems appear. On top of that, with a handy calculator on hand, Carly can readily give female car owners a quick and easy way to help estimate how much a repair would cost, without prejudice, and make all this data far more accessible and freely available.
On the business side of things, Carly will soon launch Carly for Enterprise, putting all their tech in workshops. With this, they’re allowing access for mechanics to use their platform to ease the process of troubleshooting issues for cars. Just as Carly itself is able to save consumers quite a bit of money, we could see this helping out businesses, as well. Together, they make up one of Carly’s key unique selling points: their hugely growing and thriving community. Currently, Carly has more than 3.5 million users worldwide, and there are 400,000+ of them here in the UK, offering you a powerful databank of crowdsourced automotive diagnostics information.
A Large And Growing Community Of Car Enthusiasts
When you use Carly’s Community feature, you can easily query for any specific problems that you might experience. It works basically like any other forum, with countless chatter and posts by other owners having a myriad of car issues, and their experiences could massively help you clue in on what might be wrong with your car. Best of all, it’s not just mechanics who contribute to these discussions, but other regular users, too. People who publish their car problems on Carly’s Community could now get quick answers from experienced mechanics and users, shedding light on the seriousness of the issue at hand, and what others have done to fix it.
Alternatively, if you couldn’t get any timely responses from Carly’s many human community members, Carly’s AI-powered tool could help you out with filling in the blanks. When compared to some of the other car forums that we’re used to, where car owners do share problems and seek help, Carly’s Community feature is far more refined and polished. For instance, when someone publishes a post with a problem at hand (on Carly), you can see specifically what car model and model year they’re driving, in addition to the fuel type and mileage, which should let you more easily cross-reference it with your car. Besides that, Carly’s moderation is superior, too.
A boon for me is how well curated most of the responses you get from Carly, where most other forums require you to sift through umpteen questionable replies from users who don’t really know what they’re talking about. With Carly, you could get helpful and insightful responses quickly and concisely, powered by a community built around other people who want to fix their cars and save cash doing so, without getting ripped off by mechanics and dealerships, with some DIY spirit thrown in there, too. Within Carly, you’ll even find loads of guides on how you could troubleshoot specific car problems at home, as well as guides on servicing your car at home.
Quite Helpful For Car Diagnostics And Ownership, Too
Another one of Carly’s most impressive and unexpected features is their Mileage Checker tool. Using this, you’d be able to quickly check to see if a particular car has invalid mileage readouts. These are typically done when someone uses mileage blockers to reduce the amount of mileage shown on their dashboard. When doing some research, Carly found that, so far, quite a few cars that’ve passed through their Mileage Checker tool have shown under-reported mileage (around 7%). That’s a fairly staggering amount, especially when you consider just how many cars in the UK are bought on PCP, with mileage limits encouraging owners to cut corners, not in a good way.
Besides, installing a mileage blocker is way cheaper than paying extra for a higher mileage limit on your PCP. Of course, using mileage blockers and conducting odometer fraud in general is dubious enough, legally speaking, in the UK. Thankfully, using Carly’s diagnostics scanner, they can detect any mileage irregularities and report them back to you. If you’re not yet convinced by how capable Carly’s OBD scanner and platform are, they come with a robust diagnostics suite, including my favourite, Carly’s Live Data tool. The latter can automatically recommend that you monitor specific live data readouts, based on whichever error/fault codes your car is putting out.
Then, you have Carly’s Coding tool, which works even better (at least for now) on Volkswagen Group and BMW cars. Using this, you could unlock hidden functions and features in your car that were previously inaccessible. So far, I’ve not found many other OBD scanners that could remotely do even half of that! Aside from that, if you need to manage a larger fleet of cars, I also quite like Carly’s new Battery Analysis tool. When you plug this into your car, it could help you detect parasitic battery drain, and it’ll even detect power drains in Tesla cars with EV batteries. If you want to learn more about Carly, be sure to check out our other Carly coverage, too!
